Knack 2Review

The original Knack was met with a decidedly lukewarm reception, and for good reason. It didn’t really know what it wanted to be – it was too punitive to be a kids game, but it lacked the sophistication or variety to be anything much more. The sequel isn’t without problems, but it’s much improved, with a solid mix of gameplay elements, anchored by fun combat and good pacing.

Knack’s core abilities remain much the same. He’s able to gather relics to grow in size, gaining strength and resilience in the process, and allowing for some fun shifts in scale. These are still very much prescribed – there’s no player strategy associated with growing larger, but that doesn’t mean it’s any less entertaining to rampage through a city as a 20 foot leviathan, sweeping aside enemies that once offered a challenge with a single blow.

Knack can also shed his relics in an instant to fit into small doorways, skirt under spinning blades or leap between little ledges, then reform on the other side. It’s an enjoyably dynamic ability and heavily factors into Knack 2’s platforming, puzzle solving and secrets.

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If you’ve ever played a platform game before you know what to expect here – elaborate gauntlets comprised of moving platforms, tricks, traps, steam vents and the like. The puzzle solving is similarly familiar – you’re shifting blocks around, weighing down pressure sensitive switches, bouncing lasers off mirrors to activate doohickies and so on. That’s not to say these sequences aren’t well-designed or satisfying, however – they are – they’re just staples of the genre.

There are just enough ingredients to keep things fresh too. Like the last game, Knack can gain an armour-like shell made up of different materials like ice, metal or iron. Ice Knack can freeze enemies on the spot, for instance, but he can also lock gears in place. And if you shift back to small Knack from any of these forms you’ll leave behind a statue that can be used to weigh down switches. It’s simple stuff, and the game decides when and how you use these abilities, but they’re engaging nonetheless, and in line with what Knack 2 wants to be – a well-paced action platformer with puzzle elements, in which the player is always making progress.

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Checkpointing is generous, so if you miss a jump or get killed in combat, you’re generally only moments away from where you died.

To that end, checkpointing is generous, so if you miss a jump or get killed in combat, you’re generally only moments away from where you died. That’s definitely appreciated, and means you’ll rarely get frustrated. On normal difficulty there are a few minor challenge spikes, but it’s pitched about right for average gamers, and combat encounters mix and match enemies to force you to prioritise and use different tactics. Electrical enemies need to be disabled before you can attack, for instance, while projectiles can be parried, shield-bearing foes can be opened up with a heavy attack, distance can be closed using a spinning overhead whip and groups of small, squishy enemies can be pummelled with a body slam.

There are some neat touches that add additional layers to combat too, such as the ability to stun enemies whenever a sunstone is shattered, so you can factor any sunstones in the combat arena into your plan for dispatching the pack. More and more combat options open up as you progress through the story and spend points in Knack’s skill trees.

Perhaps the most pleasant surprise in Knack 2 is just how much fun co-op is. You can play through the whole game with a friend or family member, and having two Knacks on-screen ups the chaos in combat significantly. There are some clever gameplay flourishes that are only available in co-op too, such as the ability to kick the other player into enemies, set off explosions by body slamming your co-op partner and literally punching relics off them like a machine gun. It’s a little less fun outside combat, but at least platforming sequences only need one player to make it to the end, then the other can just warp to their position. It’s the ideal solution for younger co-op partners.

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Given how much fun Knack is to control, it’s a real shame that outside of gameplay he’s one of the blandest characters in modern video games. He has almost no discernible personality. He’s simply up for whatever (clobbering things generally) and most utterances are perfunctory at best – “let’s do this” – as if he’s channelling Vin Diesel but forgot the powerful personality behind the laconic style. Small Knack, on the other hand, doesn’t talk at all, and the game only makes half-hearted attempts at physical comedy.

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Outside of gameplay, Knack is one of the blandest characters in modern video games.

It’s a massive missed opportunity. Knack is meant to be a mystically sentient life form – new to this world, essentially – so why isn’t that explored? Where’s his sense of wonder? Or confusion? Or growing understanding about the world? The absence of any kind of meaningful dialogue, and thus on-screen relationship, with the main human protagonist Lucas is also baffling. Shouldn’t their dynamic be at the heart of the game? There was so much more Japan Studio could have done with this duo.

The cast of largely uninteresting characters is wrapped into a story that would be at home in a second-rate Saturday morning kids cartoon. It’s a tale of High Goblins and city-devouring robots, ancient technologies and revenge plans… with some painfully awkward adolescent romantic tension tossed in for good measure. By the end the stakes are suitably high and you’ll become invested simply because, well, you’re ten hours in now, but it’s not good.

Big adventure, little characterisation.

Knack 2 is pretty uneven in terms of its presentation overall. There are moments of beauty, and the direction during the quick time events is appropriately stylish and energetic, but the worlds on display are merely adequate from a technical perspective, and your companions are disappointingly wooden, lacking in anything but the most basic of animations during missions.

They’re also often capable of inexplicable teleportation. I lost count of the number of times I took Knack on some impossibly acrobatic, combat-heavy route only for my human counterparts to simply turn up at the other end. One section sees Knack literally beam himself over a gaping chasm using a power available only to him and moments later – ta da! – there they are. It honestly seems harder not to implement an explanation. Just put a cable car across the chasm and activate it from the other side. Done. In a later mission they actually appear ahead of you – on the other side of a bridge that’s out. After you’ve fought a dozen enemies to get to where you are. And they’re armourless, weaponless, ordinary humans.

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Knack 2 is pretty uneven in terms of its presentation overall.

Knack 2 is lazy in other areas too. We’re all used to being artificially locked in an arena until we’ve defeated the enemies and can progress, for instance, but most games at least go to the effort of making it, like, an energy barrier or something blocking the way. In Knack 2 it is often literal blockades that simply disintegrate when the last enemy falls. It doesn’t really matter in gameplay terms, but it all adds up to a game that feels slapdash in many areas, and underestimates the intelligence of its audience. (“It’s just for kids, right?”)

It is fun though, and there’s a fair bit of content here. You’re looking at around 12 hours from start to finish to play through the story, which then unlocks New Game+, as well as a time attack mode that offers a host of bespoke challenges, and the ability to re-do any level to finish off sub-missions. I can definitely see the appeal of continuing on – I had a few more perks to unlock at the end of the story, and I was really enjoying having a full suite of combat abilities at my claw-tips.

The Verdict

Knack 2 is lacking in a number of areas, but its strengths outweigh its weaknesses. The pacing is spot-on, the combat satisfying and the gameplay varied. Co-op is genuinely good fun too, and most definitely the best way for younger gamers to get into the action. Knack 2 is definitely a step up from the original, then, but until the writing and characterisation improve drastically, it’s not going to be a true first party titan.